[center][h2][color=orangered]Midnight Tournament, Round 1.5[/color][/h2][/center]
"Give it up folks, for Danny the Thundercloud's round 2!" The MC shouted as the crowd cheered. "Start in 3, 2, 1! Go!"

A low-res looking gun materialized into her hand, and she fired into the air to signal the start of the match.

Danny immediately began to rush in. His thundercloud flew ahead of him, headed straight for Andras.

Andras picked out one of her spells and with a flourish, tossed it into the air. She thought of the friends she would call upon to cast this spell, and murmured to herself, "I invoke the magic of mountains, heed my call."

The card she had chosen shone brightly for a moment, before bursting into... An unsightly creature. Its skin was green, its stature short, and it was cursing and flailing tattered bits of cloth, barely managing to hover in place. It was nothing other than a goblin with a makeshift set of wings.

Andras gripped another card in her hand, and pointed at Danny, commanding the goblin to block him. 'If he does anything to the goblin, I'll just offer it up to summon my next creature.' Andras thought, smiling a little to herself. The Goblin swooped down to intercept Danny.

"Hey, that's no fun!" Danny shouted, his Thundercloud rising above the goblin. "Strike!"

A bolt of lightning shot out. The storm's trail now extended upwards.

Andras grinned as she saw Danny direct an attack towards the goblin. Normally, summoning a creature requires time and at least part of a chant, but some... Had their own ways of appearing. One such was a powerful monster that Andras called upon. 'Patron,' she thought. 'I offer to you this creature.'

The spell registered instantly, and another card disappeared from her hand. Summoned from the card, a large and menacing rock worm rose from out the ground, snapping up the flying goblin. It crashed against the ground, sitting between Danny and Andras. Around it, otherworldly fires seemed to blaze.

Andras laughed, covering her eyepatch with one hand. "Behold! The legendary spirit who watches over the Akki!"

Danny laughed even louder.

"Now THIS is what I'm talking about!" He shouted.

He kicked off the ground and leaped high into the air. He left a trail of electricity in the air as he jumped. He brought his hands up into a double-handed smash as the worm reared its ugly head. He came down on it, and a large amount of electricity passed from his fists into the worm.

The crowd went wild. It was one of Danny's signature moves, a sort of human thunderstrike. The electricity in his fists carried the same amount of power as a thunderbolt from his cloud.

Whether or not it felled the worm was a different question, however.

The great worm roared in pain as the shock ran through its body. "Tch. Not bad." She said to nobody in particular. She briefly considered how much that would have hurt if she was the one taking it.

'The Patron is pretty hurt. If I attack with it... It probably won't survive any counterattack.' Andras thought, her mind racing. 'But given its power... That might be fine.'

"O Patron, show him the spirits' rage!" Andras made a quick (but overall unnecessary) gesture to direct the attack.

The wounded spirit-worm reared up, the spectral flames surrounding it flaring up. Showing a sudden dexterity, it quickly whipped around, attempting to hit Danny with a sudden crashing blow to the side, augmented by the ghostly fire that surrounded the worm.

Danny saw the attack coming, and wrapped his arms around the worm as it struck. It was way too wide to get even a good enough breadth around it to hold onto, but his grip was strong.

"Ow!" Danny shouted, thrashing his feet up. There was fire, after all.

Electricity was streaming into the worm, but not with as much intensity as before. It seemed to be a more passive ability compared to his punch. In a few moments, the worm would be dead, but there was also the fire.

"Strike!" Danny said. The thundercloud was directly above him, and it struck.

The worm roared, and the fire faded away. It was dead it would seem.

Danny landed on the ground, hair and clothes singed in a lot of places, and he seemed unsteady.

"I... forgot," He said. "I'm not immune to my own lightning..."

And then he fell.

Andras watched Danny fall. At the same time, the Patron was unable to maintain its material form, and dissolved into the same golden specks of light that the cards seemed to be made of.

Andras posed triumphantly, letting her cards float around her once again. "A worthy challenger... But I am the winner." After a few moments of silence, she opened her eye and looked at Danny. "Hey... Are you alright?" Her concern broke her cool facade.

"Hahahaha... no." Danny croaked, then he passed out.

"...Make way," Jokey said. It seemed like he'd swapped out his cap for a medical worker hard-hat. There was an actual medic as well, carrying a stretcher between them, and an ambulance nearby which had seemingly appeared from nowhere.

They loaded Danny onto the stretcher and shuffled off for the ambulance, the thundercloud following them all the while.

"And it seems we have a winner!" The MC announced. She squinted at the tournament board. "Next match, &ras VS, Massami!"

[@Crowvette] [@Bartimaeus]